Ethiopia’s agricultural transformation is the most promising in Africa despite recent land related conflicts, experts have said.
Grow Africa, an investment company working in 12 African countries including Ethiopia, said the country’s policy is the most successful in Africa in terms of converting agriculture from just production to an agri-business model.
According to Grow Africa’s executive director, William Asiko, the creation of the Agricultural Transformation Agency (ATA) has placed Ethiopia ahead of other African countries in terms of providing extension services to farmers.
“Despite the land conflict, I know the Ethiopian government is way ahead of other African countries in terms of supporting private investment in agricultural production and processing,” said Asiko.
According to Asiko, the government’s creation of a commodities exchange has enabled farmers to sell their produce in bulk during an auction. This has attracted buyers because the prices are determined by the market, he said.
“Policy makers insist that Agriculture is critical in Africa but this is not translating into greater investment into agriculture,” said Asiko. “This is because there is inconsistency in what policy makers say and what is actually happening on the ground. This lack of political will need to be solved.”
The International Maize and Wheat Improvement Centre (CMMYT) said land conflict in Ethiopia is not likely to affect farmers much because there has been serious investment in the country’s agriculture.
For instance, maize production has increased from just 1.5 tonnes per hectare 10 years ago to 3.4 tonnes per hectare presently, argued Tsedeke Abate, Leader, Stress Tolerant Maize for Africa (STMA) at CMMYT.
“Ethiopia has the largest number of extension workers in Africa,” said Abate. “The government gives farmers inputs like fertilizers and seeds which have increased production.”
Abate said land conflict is not only happening in Ethiopia, but it is an issue that is affecting the whole African continent. This can be resolved through good policies, he said.
World Bank officials said farmers must be able to access land equitably if Africa is to achieve its agricultural transformation.
Ademola Braimoh, the coordinator, climate smart agriculture, Africa Region, at the World Bank, said in cases where foreign investors are involved governments should make policy and tenure reforms to ensure small holder farmers can still access land.
“Africa’s land tenure system should guarantee equal access to land for both locals and foreign investors,” said Braimoh.
Khalid Bomba, chief executive officer, ATA, Ethiopia, said the country can solve land related conflicts by increasing small scale farmers’ incomes.
According to him, ATA’s approach is not shifting away from small scale farming but making it more commercial and market oriented.
“We think this can reduce the type of conflict that sometimes emerges in Ethiopia because the focus is not only in agricultural production but also in processing, value addition, transportation and logistics involving entire communities,” said Bomba.
ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia (PAMACC News) - Mainstreaming climate information and climate information services into legislation and development policies in different African countries is the main driver for the much needed actions in the fight against climate change, experts have said.
It is against this backdrop that parliamentarians from African countries joined a training workshop that came immediately after the sixth conference on climate change and development in Africa (CCDA-VI) in Addis Ababa-Ethiopia.
“This training is geared at setting the scene for lawmakers to factor climate information issues in budgetary allocation in their countries,” said Thierry Amoussougo of Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) who presided over the workshop opening on behalf of the secretary general, Carlos Lopez.
The workshop accordingly focused on building capacities of decision makers in the use of climate information and services for long term planning and decision making in African countries.
“We are looking at strategies and approaches that can be implemented by lawmakers and governments to ensure climate change policies are mainstreamed into development planning and actions in different African countries,” said Stephen Mutimba, managing director of Camco Clean Energy-Kenya and lead trainer at the workshop.
Participants were drilled on the concepts of climate information and services, types of climate information and uses, use of climate information in agriculture, infrastructure, disaster risk reduction, urban and special development and sectoral planning.
The workshop also focused on the role of climate information in domesticating international agreements such as the Paris Climate talks, legislation for improving climate information and services, including budgeting and institutional development and also how to mainstream such information and services into laws, plans and policies for better long term decision making.
The workshop organizers, the African Climate Policy Center of the ECA, pointed out that the training is in recognition of the disproportionate effects of climate change impacts, such as droughts, floods and other extreme weather events on women and youths.
“These vulnerable groups access climate information services differently from the rest of society, thus climate information services, with pro-active targeting where possible, need to be integrated throughout climate interventions for the benefit of women, girls and the youth, “ says James Murombedzi, Officer-in-Charge, ACPC-ECA.
Presenting the training guide on climate change titled “Climate change solutions”, the managing director of Camco-Clean Energy in Kenya said, it was a rich working tool replete with useful information on the intricacies of climate change, especially in the area of availing climate information.
“Climate information refers to climate data that is obtained from observations of climate (temperature ,precipitation from weather centers)and also data from climate model output. It entails the transformation of climate related data together with other related information and data into customized products such as projections, forecast, information, trends, economic analyses, counseling on best practices, development and evaluation of solutions and other services in relation to climate that are useful to society,” the guide explained.
Challenges
The question of adapted infrastructure in many African countries to tackle climate challenges was also raised by law makers. According to some parliamentarians, human skills and other requirements were necessary for the production and delivery of climate information and services.
“There is need to not only build the capacities of the required human resources but also to invest in adapted climate information infrastructure and the create the enabling environment for the different institutions involved in climate information delivery,” said Chalikosa Mambalaskylvia,MP from Zambia.
Generally participants at the workshop agreed that appropriate and reliable climate information services in Africa are hampered by lack of capacity building, insufficient finance, limited technical capacity to manage weather information system, systematic processes for packaging, translating and disseminating climate information and warnings as well as the lack of integration with disaster management systems.
The three day workshop also saw the participation of civil society organizations, the media represented by the Pan African Media Alliance for Climate Change, PAMACC, who all identified strategies and solutions to the challenges the youths and women face in accessing climate information services.
ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia (PAMACC News) - Mainstreaming climate information and climate information services into legislation and development policies in different African countries is the main driver for the much needed actions in the fight against climate change, experts have said.
It is against this backdrop that parliamentarians from African countries joined a training workshop that came immediately after the sixth conference on climate change and development in Africa (CCDA-VI) in Addis Ababa-Ethiopia.
“This training is geared at setting the scene for lawmakers to factor climate information issues in budgetary allocation in their countries,” said Thierry Amoussougo of Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) who presided over the workshop opening on behalf of the secretary general, Carlos Lopez.
The workshop accordingly focused on building capacities of decision makers in the use of climate information and services for long term planning and decision making in African countries.
“We are looking at strategies and approaches that can be implemented by lawmakers and governments to ensure climate change policies are mainstreamed into development planning and actions in different African countries,” said Stephen Mutimba, managing director of Camco Clean Energy-Kenya and lead trainer at the workshop.
Participants were drilled on the concepts of climate information and services, types of climate information and uses, use of climate information in agriculture, infrastructure, disaster risk reduction, urban and special development and sectoral planning.
The workshop also focused on the role of climate information in domesticating international agreements such as the Paris Climate talks, legislation for improving climate information and services, including budgeting and institutional development and also how to mainstream such information and services into laws, plans and policies for better long term decision making.
The workshop organizers, the African Climate Policy Center of the ECA, pointed out that the training is in recognition of the disproportionate effects of climate change impacts, such as droughts, floods and other extreme weather events on women and youths.
“These vulnerable groups access climate information services differently from the rest of society, thus climate information services, with pro-active targeting where possible, need to be integrated throughout climate interventions for the benefit of women, girls and the youth, “ says James Murombedzi, Officer-in-Charge, ACPC-ECA.
Presenting the training guide on climate change titled “Climate change solutions”, the managing director of Camco-Clean Energy in Kenya said, it was a rich working tool replete with useful information on the intricacies of climate change, especially in the area of availing climate information.
“Climate information refers to climate data that is obtained from observations of climate (temperature ,precipitation from weather centers)and also data from climate model output. It entails the transformation of climate related data together with other related information and data into customized products such as projections, forecast, information, trends, economic analyses, counseling on best practices, development and evaluation of solutions and other services in relation to climate that are useful to society,” the guide explained.
Challenges
The question of adapted infrastructure in many African countries to tackle climate challenges was also raised by law makers. According to some parliamentarians, human skills and other requirements were necessary for the production and delivery of climate information and services.
“There is need to not only build the capacities of the required human resources but also to invest in adapted climate information infrastructure and the create the enabling environment for the different institutions involved in climate information delivery,” said Chalikosa Mambalaskylvia,MP from Zambia.
Generally participants at the workshop agreed that appropriate and reliable climate information services in Africa are hampered by lack of capacity building, insufficient finance, limited technical capacity to manage weather information system, systematic processes for packaging, translating and disseminating climate information and warnings as well as the lack of integration with disaster management systems.
The three day workshop also saw the participation of civil society organizations, the media represented by the Pan African Media Alliance for Climate Change, PAMACC, who all identified strategies and solutions to the challenges the youths and women face in accessing climate information services.
DDIS ABABA, Ethiopia (PAMACC News) - Africa remains the only region in the developing world where agricultural yields are low and continue to decline.
According to the Africa Climate Policy Centre (ACPC), despite recent progress in agricultural and land management technologies, agricultural production in most parts of the continent is still at subsistence levels, with the smallholder producers who dominate the agricultural production landscape barely able to meet their own consumption needs.
Regrettably, Climate change and climate variability has added to these historic challenges that face the agricultural sector in Africa. With increased incidences of extreme weather events, including droughts and large fluctuations in precipitation patterns, and shortening of the lengths of growing periods, Africa’s largely rain-fed driven agricultural production, has been exposed to serious uncertainties.
Agricultural production is very important in assisting food security and poverty alleviation, especially in rural African households, a point that Ephraim Belemu, a law maker from Zambia, made at a round-table discussion of African Members of Parliament on the need for effective Climate Information Services to smallholder farmers, at the Sixth Conference on Climate Change and Development in Africa, in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
“For us in Zambia, most smallholders rely on rain-fed Agriculture such that any shift in rainfall pattern as has been happening in recent years affects the planning and ultimate production capacity of farmers,” said Belemu, citing the 2015/16 farming season which left most farmers helpless at the hands of an El Nino induced drought.
However, it is believed that improved and well-coordinated weather information systems would lessen this production uncertainty, a point that the United Nations Food and Agricultural Organization- FAO Director-General José Graziano made during this year’s World Food day:
"As usual the poorest and the hungry suffer the most and the vast majority of them are small family farmers that live in rural areas of developing countries," he said, stressing the importance of adaptation and mitigation based on "much better access to appropriate technologies, knowledge, markets, information and investments".
FAO therefore wants to see Climate change, hunger and poverty being addressed together in order to achieve the sustainable development goals, not forgetting the landmark Paris Agreement set by the international community last year.
For Africa, however, there are still some teething issues that need to be addressed especially regarding the Paris Agreement. “There is a big concern that policies are not prioritizing climate change related issues and countries,” said James Murombedzi, officer in Charge of the Africa Climate Policy Centre (ACPC).
In his summary of overarching issues discussed during the conference, Murombedzi also noted the importance of an action plan on how and what Africa wants to see regarding means of implementation, a key component of the Paris Agreement to be discussed at the COP 22 in Marrakech, Morocco.
“Agriculture is a key sector for Africa’s transformation and adaptation, as has been observed, remains a key component, but it requires sustainable means of implementation such as finance and technology transfer,” said Murombedzi, further stressing the need for African countries to revisit their nationally determined Contributions and align them with national, regional and international development aspirations.
Opportunities
There is, however, hope for Africa. According to available data, an increase of Agriculture investments by governments, accompanied with policies that promote production, and encourage adaptation to existing climate variability and long-term climate change, would help the continent’s transformative agenda.
Experts have therefore recommended that one key policy issue to support the ability of smallholding producers to adapt to the effects of climate variability and change, is the integration of climate change and climate variability information into development policies.
“Therefore, we thought it is important to first engage Parliamentarians in this process of integrating climate information services in policies,” said Murombedzi of ACPC, adding “Parliamentarians are key decision makers especially in influencing policy in their respective countries.”
But even as climate information services are being integrated in national policies, there is a call not to leave behind the affected communities most of whom leave in rural areas.
In a special message on World Food day, Pope Francis said: "From the wisdom of rural communities we can learn a style of life that can help defend us from the logic of consumerism and production at any cost, a logic that, cloaked in good justification, such as increasing population, is in reality aimed solely at the increase in profit," the pontiff said.
In echoing this reasoning, Silvia Chalikosa, a law maker from Zambia believes “there is still hope for as long as the rural populace is not left behind,” because they hold the key to the success of climate adaptation policies.
Friday Phiri
